Motel room yields little

Steven Kazmierczak checked into a hotel near campus three days before carrying out his deadly shooting spree at Northern Illinois University, paying cash and signing his name only as "Steven" on a slip of paper, according to the hotel manager.

The shooter was last seen at the Travelodge -- where he smoked cigarettes and downed energy drinks and cold medicine -- on Tuesday, hotel manager Jay Patel said.

Authorities found a duffel bag, with the zippers glued shut, that he had left in the room, said Lt. Gary Spangler of the DeKalb Police Department. A bomb squad safely opened the bag Friday, Spangler said.

Spangler would not comment on what was found in the bag.

The gunman also left behind a laptop computer, which was seized by investigators, Patel said.

The discoveries added to the puzzles surrounding the shooter, a 27-year-old graduate student some called quiet, dependable and fun-loving who returned to his alma mater on Valentine's Day, leaving five people dead before turning a gun on himself.

A former employee at a Chicago psychiatric treatment center said the gunman was placed there after high school by his parents. She said he used to cut himself, and had resisted taking his medications.

He also had a short-lived stint as a prison guard that ended abruptly when he didn't show up for work. He was in the Army for about six months in 2001-02, but he told a friend he'd gotten a psychological discharge.

Exactly what set him off -- and why he picked his former university and that particular lecture hall -- remained a mystery.

Photographs from inside the shooter's room showed a bag of cotton balls on the bed, a flashlight on a nightstand, and empty bottles of water, Gatorade and Red Bull in a bedside drawer.

Spread around the room on counters, in drawers and in the trash were empty cartons of cigarettes, a container of first aid cream, a box of adhesive bandages, partially filled blister packs of non-prescription pain relievers, a variety of cold medicines and decongestants, and a facial moisturizer.

The shooter's godfather, Richard Grafer, confirmed Saturday that his godson told him he'd broken up with a girlfriend before Christmas. "He wasn't distraught," Grafer said.

"Then he said, 'We'll play chess and we'll talk.' And I said, 'Yeah, I'd love it,' " Grafer said. The conversation took place on Tuesday, Grafer said, and the shooter told his godfather he'd call him again on Saturday.

Three days after he checked into the room, the shooter, armed with three handguns and a pump-action shotgun, stepped from behind a screen on the lecture hall's stage and opened fire on a geology class. He killed five students Thursday before committing suicide.

University Police Chief Donald Grady said Friday that the shooter had become erratic in the past two weeks after he stopped taking his medication.

The shooter spent more than a year at the Thresholds-Mary Hill House in the late 1990s, former house manager Louise Gbadamashi told The Associated Press. His parents placed him there after high school because he had become "unruly" at home, she said.

Gbadamashi said she couldn't remember any instances of him being violent.

"He never wanted to identify with being mentally ill," she said. "That was part of the problem."

The attack was baffling to many of those who knew him.

"Steve was the most gentle, quiet guy in the world. ... He had a passion for helping people," said Jim Thomas, an emeritus professor of sociology and criminology at Northern Illinois who taught the shooter, promoted him to a teacher's aide and became his friend.

The shooter once told Thomas about getting a discharge from the Army.

"It was no major deal, a kind of incompatibility discharge -- for a state of mind, not for any behavior," Thomas said. "He was concerned that that on his record might be a stigma."

The shooter enlisted in September 2001, but was discharged in February 2002 for an "unspecified" reason, Army spokesman Paul Boyce said.

He worked from Sept. 24 to Oct. 9 as a corrections officer at the Rockville Correctional Facility, a medium-security prison in Rockville, Ind. His tenure there ended when "he just didn't show up one day," Indiana prisons spokesman Doug Garrison said.

On Feb. 9, the shooter walked into a Champaign gun store and picked up two guns -- a Remington shotgun and a Glock 9mm handgun. He bought the two other handguns at the same shop -- a Hi-Point .380 on Dec. 30 and a Sig Sauer on Aug. 6.

All four guns were bought legally from a federally licensed firearms dealer, said Thomas Ahern, a spokesman for the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. At least one criminal background check was performed -- the shooter had no criminal record.

He had a State Police-issued FOID, or firearms owners identification card, which is required in Illinois to own a gun, authorities said. Such cards are rarely issued to those with recent mental health problems.

NIU President John Peters said the shooter compiled "a very good academic record, no record of trouble" at the 25,000-student campus in DeKalb. He won at least two awards and served as an officer in two student groups dedicated to promoting understanding of the criminal justice system.

The shooter grew up in Elk Grove Village. He was a B student at Elk Grove High School, where school district spokeswoman Venetia Miles said he was active in band and took Japanese before graduating in 1998. He was also in the chess club.

Nobody answered the door Saturday morning at the Urbana home of the shooter's sister, Susan. But sobs could be heard through the door of the Urbana home, where a statement was posted:

"Our heartfelt prayers and deepest sympathies are extended to the families, victims, and all other persons involved in the Northern Illinois University tragedy. We are both shocked and saddened. In addition to the loss of innocent lives, Steven was a member of our family. We are grieving his loss as well as the loss of life resulting in his actions."

On the door of the shooter's Champaign apartment, the building management posted a statement saying he had lived there since June 6, 2007. It called him a "a quiet resident who paid his rent, and did not otherwise come to the attention of the staff and management," at the apartment complex.

At NIU, six white crosses were placed on a snow-covered hill around the center of campus, which was closed Friday. They included the names of four victims -- Daniel Parmenter, Ryanne Mace, Julianna Gehant, Catalina Garcia. The two other crosses were blank, though officials have identified the shooter's final victim as Gayle Dubowski.

By Friday night, dozens of candles flickered in packed snow at makeshift memorials around campus as hundreds of students, mostly wearing the school colors of red and black, packed a memorial service.

"It's kind of overwhelming. It feels strong, it feels like we're all in this together," said Carlee Siggeman, 18, a freshman from Genoa who attended the vigil with friends.